German-American culture without the World Wars

[SpanishSpy]

I stumbled upon this really interesting comment in /r/AskanAmerican discussing German influences on American culture had the World Wars not marginalized it to the extent it had done.

Link is here; for ease of access it is quoted below.

1. Oktoberfest would be as big as or bigger than St. Patrick's Day.
   [*]The Green Bay Packers would use German in chants and stuff, the same way the Minnesota Vikings have a gjallarhorn and say "Skol!"
   [*]Existing Midwestern food would be respected as an actual cultural variant rather than just viewed as poor-people food.
   [*]Everything in America involving hotdogs would be replaced by bratwursts the way God intended.
   [*]Sauerkraut would be an actual food. "Southwestern sauerkraut" would've arisen naturally by the merger of Hispanic spices and German pickling to fill the cuilnary void currently slowly being filled by kimchi.
   [*]Rich fatty spreads based on braunschweiger (the American name for a type of pork liver sausage, just like how beef patties are hamburgers and hot dogs can also be called frankfruters) would be around to fill the culinary place currently occupied by guacamole. Perhaps the avocado revolution may never have happened in the first place if these had become popular.
   [*]Beer cheese soup would take its place alongside lobster bisque. We'd be talking about "German cucumber salad" instead of tzatziki. "Schnitzel" would get bastardized and become a name for anything fried and breaded like fried chicken or fried fish instead of specifically the ones pounded flat.
   [*]Polka would be weird, but it would be around, like mariachi.
   [*]Wisconsin bar culture would spread beyond Wisconsin to encompass much of the North.
   [*]

Are there any other diversions we might see in this scenario?

 

[d32123]

While I think there's a case to be made that the First World War might have accelerated the assimilation of German Americans, I do think that the much bigger impact was the overall push to assimilate white ethnic groups here during the interwar period and the first Red Scare. I like the list provided, as it shows very minor cultural differences that could have arisen, but I don't think German American identity would have necessarily been massively stronger without another wave of German immigrants and I don't think we'd have wide swaths of the Midwest speaking German in the 21st century as is often proposed in these scenarios.

 

[Thande]

I don't think we'd have wide swaths of the Midwest speaking German in the 21st century as is often proposed in these scenarios.

I agree that sort of thing is excessive - what I find interesting is how much of the Midwest has cultural stuff that screams German to my eyes but isn't explicitly described as German because of WW1.

 

[SpanishSpy]

I agree that sort of thing is excessive - what I find interesting is how much of the Midwest has cultural stuff that screams German to my eyes but isn't explicitly described as German because of WW1.

I raised this point in the AH.com thread - a lot of things of German origin are simply seen as American on this side of the pond (hamburgers, hot dogs, American-style cakes, etc.).

What stood out to you as German in the Midwest?